Henry ford early life
Charles E. Sorensen
American businessman (–)
Charles E. Sorensen | |
|---|---|
| Born | Carl Emil Sørensen ()September 7, Copenhagen, Denmark |
| Died | August 11, () (aged&#;86) Bethesda, Maryland, United States |
| Nationality | Danish-American |
Charles Emil Sorensen (7 September – 11 August ) was a Danish-American principal of the Ford Motor Company during its first four decades.
All of henry ford inventions Men need counsel and men need help, often special help; and all this ought to be rendered for decency's sake. Henry Ford: An Interpretation. However, Ford did acknowledge that many managers were basically too bad at managing to understand this fact. In the s, he began work to turn Sudbury , Massachusetts, into a themed historical village.Like most other managers at Ford at the time, he did not have an official job title, but he served functionally as a patternmaker, foundry engineer, mechanical engineer, industrial engineer, production manager, and executive in charge of all production.
By the end of his career, he had become an officer of the company: a vice president and a director.
Speaking figuratively, he saw himself during most of his career as "a viceroy ruling the production province of the Ford empire," and at the end as a "regent," who managed the company during the "interregnum" between the reigns of Henry Ford I and Henry Ford II.
Early life
Sorensen emigrated from Denmark to the United States with his parents when he was 4.
He first worked as a surveyor's assistant and then apprenticed at the Jewett Stove Works in Buffalo, New York as a patternmaker and foundryman.[1]
Early career
In , the family moved to Detroit, and while working at a foundry in Detroit, he met Henry Ford. In , he accepted a job as a patternmaker at Ford Motor Company.
Henry ford patents This article is about the American industrialist. His innovations not only shaped the way we manufacture products but also had a profound impact on modern transportation and industrial practices. Sloan and the Triumph of General Motors. Michigan History.By , he was head of the pattern department. He translated Ford's ideas, which came to him in the form of simple sketches or descriptions, into prototypes and into the patterns from which the parts would be cast.
Sorensen (with others, notably Walter Flanders, Clarence Avery, and Ed Martin) is credited with developing the first automotive assembly line, having formulated the idea of moving a product (for cars, that would be in the form of the chassis) through multiple workstations.
His innovations were widely applied to the mass production of complex products, which average people could afford.
Henry ford charcoal Ford faced health issues later in life, including a series of strokes. Beginning in , with the requisitioning of between and French POWs to work as slave laborers, Ford-Werke contravened Article 31 of the Geneva Convention. He moved the schoolhouse supposedly referred to in the " Mary Had a Little Lamb " nursery rhyme from Sterling , Massachusetts, and purchased the historic Wayside Inn. Retrieved June 16,One Sunday in , at the Ford Piquette Avenue Plant, Sorensen asserted that he and another Ford executive, Charles Lewis, tested his idea. Apparently, by the end of the day, he had determined that moving a car in a straight line from one end of the factory to the other, with parts added along the way by specialized workers performing repetitive tasks, with the stockrooms also placed strategically along the line, was the most efficient and therefore the cheapest way to build an automobile.
To prove his theory, he then towed an automobile chassis on a rope over his shoulders through the Ford plant while others added the parts.
Later life
Sorensen was a major contributor to the launch of the Highland Park Ford Plant in ,[2] where he was second in command to production chief Peter (Ed) Martin.
Henry ford inventions cars: Bentley Historical Library. Ford opened plants and operations throughout the world. LCCN While working as an engineer for the Edison Illuminating Company in Detroit, Henry Ford built his first gasoline-powered horseless carriage, the Quadricycle, in the shed behind his home.
He then helped with the development of the Fordson tractor and modernization of Edsel Ford's Lincoln when it was purchased by Ford from Henry M. Leland in Following transfer of auto assembly to the Rouge in the late s, he was a "key leader" in manufacturing as number two man to Ed Martin, who was made vice president of manufacturing in He was manager of production planning and development.[3] "Ed Martin, who was plant superintendent, and I practically lived at the Rouge."[4] It has been said he considered himself the "Head of Production," and Henry Ford's "right-hand man," but he was only one of at least six company leaders claiming that distinction.
(Ford's practice of telling his men to "[j]ust go out there and run the plant […] [a]nd don't worry about titles"[5] contributed to these variations in viewpoints.)
Sorensen's help in innovating foundry practice for mass production earned for him from Henry Ford the nickname of "Cast-Iron Charlie" during the company's first decade,[6] when he invented (or at least independently reinvented) the use of metal patterns, instead of wood ones, to withstand the huge number of moldmaking cycles needed for mass production and methods of core registration to position the cores accurately without relying on the sand under them to assist in the registration.
In Sorensen joined Henry and Edsel Ford as the three US directors out of seven on the board of Ford's new reorganized independent European operations. During the s, Sorensen was also responsible for production techniques allowing the manufacture of a sophisticated V-8 engine block from a single casting, and using a more automated foundry workflow than ever before.[7] The resulting Ford Flathead engine continued in production until ; a derivative design was used in French military vehicles into the s.
During the early s, Sorensen had responsibility for Ford's defense contracts, including Ford's Jeep and aircraft engines and production of the B Liberator bomber. He led the design of the Willow Run plant, where the Bs were made, applying all of his previous experience in the development and refinement of mass production methods.[8] Each was made up of , parts, and they were turned out at a still astonishing rate of one per hour; the previous production rate was one per day.
He was knighted by the king of Denmark and made a member of the Order of the Dannebrog for his accomplishments.
During his career, he was noted for his brilliance in organization and his hard-driving personality, and also for insensitivity to others and an explosive temper. Sorensen's memoirs intended to show how the Ford industrial empire was kept intact and his hard struggle to bring Henry Ford II to the direction of its destinies.
After leaving the navy, a year-old Henry Ford II joined company management as a vice-president on December 15, Sorensen, who had mentored the young Ford, was not offered a major role by him. He requested retirement in December , to be effective January 1, , as previously agreed with the elder Ford in His retirement was effective on March 13, He then accepted a position as president of automaker Willys-Overland, presiding over the transition from wartime production back to civilian-market production.
Sorensen effectively retired after clashes with the board but retained a title and salary as vice-chairman from until full retirement in [9] Willys became Kaiser Jeep and was later acquired by American Motors Corporation (AMC).
AMC was later bought out by Chrysler.
Sorensen retired in Florida and US Virgin Islands. He had extensive land holdings in Cuba (which were seized by the new government after the Cuban revolution). He died on August 28, , at Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland.[10] He is buried in Miami Beach, Florida. He was preceded in death by his first wife Helen (née Mitchell) Sorensen and son Clifford Sorensen.
References
- ^Borth, Christy.Henry ford inventions biography wikipedia Ford married Clara Jane Bryant — on April 11, , and supported himself by farming and running a sawmill. It still stands today as a museum. He was the owner of the company. They formed a coalition of Jewish groups for the same purpose and raised constant objections in the Detroit press.
Masters of Mass Production, p. , Bobbs-Merrill Co., Indianapolis, IN,
- ^Hounshell , pp.&#;–
- ^Herman , pp.&#;19, 23,
- ^Sorensen , p.&#;
- ^Sorensen , pp.&#;50,
- ^Sorensen , p.&#;
- ^Sorensen , pp.&#;–
- ^Herman , pp.&#;–42
- ^Herman , pp.&#;–3
- ^Herman , p.&#;
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- Hounshell, David A. (), From the American System to Mass Production, – The Development of Manufacturing Technology in the United States, Baltimore, Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press, ISBN&#;, LCCN&#;, OCLC&#;
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